Half of Puerto Ricans Still Lack Access to Clean Water

Almost a week and a half after Hurricane Maria devastated Puerto Rico, about half of the island’s 3.4 million residents still lack access to clean drinking water, according to the U.S. Department of Defense, while 95 percent remain without power.

Puerto Rican Governor Ricardo Rossello noted, however, Saturday that some progress has been made. He said 51 of the island’s 60 hospitals are now open and airports and seaports are receiving shipments.

“We have 100 percent of landline telephones working now,” Rossello said, “although we still don’t have the robust telecom network ... we’re only at 33 percent.”

Rossello said the island’s roads are being cleared, but there are still some communities where the hurricane’s devastation has made travel difficult.

Trucks, diesel on the way

The U.S. Defense Department said 100 trucks carrying diesel and gasoline fuel will arrive by barge in San Juan, the island’s capital and largest city, by Monday. There have been complaints that food and other necessities were not being delivered across the island because there were not enough trucks and truck drivers to make the deliveries.

Life on the island remains hard, however, with residents lining up in the sweltering heat to get gas, food and cash.

VOA’s Celia Mendoza, who is in Puerto Rico, says all store transactions are in cash because shops do not have the electricity for card transactions. There are long lines at cash machines, Mendoza reports, with customers hoping to get access to their funds before the machines’ generators are shut down when the banks close.

​Trump Twitter tirade

U.S. President Donald Trump, from his golf club in New Jersey, launched a bitter Twitter tirade Saturday morning against San Juan Mayor Carmen Yulin Cruz, who has been critical of the Trump administration’s hurricane efforts. Cruz, whose home has been damaged in the storm, is living in a shelter with her family.

Cruz accused the Trump administration of “killing us with the inefficiency” and begged Trump to “make sure somebody is in charge that is up to the task of saving lives.”

The Republican president initiated his tweets, some of which were apparently deleted minutes later, by suggesting Cruz’s criticism was instigated by Democrats.

Trump then denounced two news organizations for what he apparently believed has been biased coverage of the recovery efforts with the ultimate aim of disparaging him.

He then reiterated he will soon get a first-hand view of the devastation on Puerto Rico and possibly in the U.S. Virgin Islands.

Trump then broadened his attack on the news media, accusing the networks of hindering recovery efforts.

It is not immediately clear if the president will meet with Mayor Cruz when he visits the island.

Tone softens

Later Saturday, Trump softened his tone somewhat: “Despite the Fake News Media in conjunction with the Dems, an amazing job is being done in Puerto Rico. Great people!”

Acting Homeland Security Administration Secretary Elaine Duke, meanwhile, flew over hurricane devastated Puerto Rico Friday and reassured residents the federal government understands the severity of the ongoing human catastrophe facing the U.S. territory.

“I know the people of Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands are suffering,” Duke told a news conference in San Juan. “We are here and we have been here to help them. We are continuing to bring additional supplies and personnel to further assist distribution efforts on the ground.”

Duke’s unannounced trip to the island came hours after Cruz ridiculed comments the Homeland Security chief made at a White House briefing Thursday, where she described the life-saving efforts of relief workers as “a good news story.”

In a widely publicized CNN interview, Cruz replied angrily, saying, “This is not a good news story. This is a people are dying’ story. This is a life or death story,”

Clearly stung by Cruz’s barb, Duke made clear that she did not consider the current conditions in Puerto Rico satisfactory.

“Yesterday I was asked if I was happy and satisfied with the recovery,” she said. I am proud of the work that’s being done. I’m proud of Americans helping Americans, friends and strangers alike. I am proud of the work DOD, (Department of Defense, FEMA (Federal Emergency Management Administration) and the territory, along with first responders are doing.

“The president and I will not be satisfied, however, until every Puerto Rican is back home, the power is back on, clean water is freely available, schools and hospitals are fully open, and the Puerto Rican economy is working,” the secretary said.

​EPA assesses Superfund sites

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency said in a statement that it has deployed assessment teams to Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands. ”We have begun re-assessing Superfund sites, oil sites, and chemical facilities in Puerto Rico and the USVI as part of EPA’s response to Hurricane Maria,” the agency said. It also initial assessments found the Superfund sites to have no significant damage. The agency is also working to assess the conditions of water and sewage treatment plants in Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands.

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Price’s Resignation Makes GOP Health Care Push Harder

BRANCHBURG, N.J. — 

The ouster of Tom Price as President Donald Trump’s health secretary is yet another self-inflicted blow for Republicans wishing to put their own stamp on health care — and the latest distraction for a White House struggling to advance its agenda after months of turmoil.

Price resigned Friday amid investigations into his use of costly charter flights for official travel at taxpayer expense. His exit makes it even more unlikely that Republicans will be able to deliver on their promise to repeal and replace former President Barack Obama’s law, even though they control the White House and both chambers of Congress.

“I think health care is a dead letter through the next election,” Joe Antos, a policy expert with the business-oriented American Enterprise Institute, said Saturday.

​Momentum lost

The health secretary’s exit capped a week in which a last-ditch GOP health care bill failed to advance in the Senate. Regaining momentum will be more difficult now that the White House also has to find a replacement for Price. That makes it harder to visualize how the administration and congressional Republicans can fulfill their goal of remaking the health care system along conservative lines, although Trump has said he’s confident a plan can pass early next year.

Price, who Trump concluded had become a distraction, had been on the rocks with the president since before the travel flap. A former Republican congressman from Georgia, he proved less helpful than expected on the health care fight. Price played a supporting role while Vice President Mike Pence took the lead, especially with the Senate.

The health secretary’s departure, the latest in a list that now includes Trump’s chief of staff, national security adviser, press secretary and two communications directors, is also unlikely to end what has been a steady drip of revelations about potentially inappropriate travel on the part of Cabinet members.

​Others under scrutiny

Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin has come under fire for requesting a government aircraft to use on his honeymoon, while Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke said he’d taken three charter flights while in office, including a $12,375 late-night trip from Las Vegas to his home state of Montana in June. The Environmental Protection Agency’s inspector general has opened an inquiry into Administrator Scott Pruitt’s frequent taxpayer-funded travel on commercial planes.

The House Oversight and Government Reform committee has launched a governmentwide investigation of top political appointees’ travel.

Trump ran on a pledge to “drain the swamp” in Washington and has taken pride in his efforts to reduce federal spending and negotiate better deals on behalf of American taxpayers.

In a memo Friday, White House budget director Mick Mulvaney said all travel on government-owned, rented, leased or chartered aircraft will now have to be approved by the president’s chief of staff, John Kelly. That gives more oversight power to a man who has tried to impose order and structure on what has been a chaotic White House.

Nominee faces gauntlet

On health care, the task of installing another secretary at the Health and Human Services department won’t be easy.

The nominee will have to run the gauntlet of Senate confirmation. The already contentious process will be more challenging as Democrats shift from playing defense to offense on health care, heartened by the survival of the Affordable Care Act and polls showing support for the government’s leading role in health care.

And HHS is not the only department that needs a leader. Trump has yet to pick a permanent replacement for Kelly, who left his previous job running the Department of Homeland Security in July.

​Potential candidates

Two potential candidates for health secretary already hold senior Senate-confirmed posts at HHS, which could be a plus for the White House.

Seema Verma leads the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, which runs major insurance programs. Scott Gottlieb heads the Food and Drug Administration, which has regulatory authority across pharmaceuticals and consumer products.

Verma is a protege of Pence, who played a major role in negotiations with Congress this year on the futile Obamacare repeal effort.

Verma is seen as a talented policy expert, but she’s still relatively new to the ways of Washington. Gottlieb is a veteran, but he may prefer the FDA and its clearly defined mission to the quicksand of health care policy.

Also mentioned is Louisiana GOP Sen. Bill Cassidy, co-author of the last Republican health care bill that failed to advance. Cassidy would probably win confirmation easily, but his prospects in the Senate appear bright, and he may not want to depart for a Cabinet post in a tumultuous administration.

Another potential candidate is Florida’s Republican Gov. Rick Scott, a former hospital executive who is term-limited after 2018. But Scott is expected to mount a Senate campaign against Democratic incumbent Sen. Bill Nelson next year, and he may have ambitions and interests beyond health care.

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Study: Trump Immigration Policies to Cost Michigan

At the turn of the century, Bangladeshi immigrant Shaker Sadeak packed his bags in New York City and headed to Michigan — a state that he says afforded him the opportunity to make a living and go to school at the same time.

Seven years later, he took another step, opening his own wholesale and retail fabric shop, India Fashion, in Hamtramck, Michigan's Banglatown. Surrounded by Bengali restaurants, spice shops and groceries, his business, like the street upon which it lives, has flourished over time.

When VOA visited this summer, new and established businesses were steadily replacing abandoned lots along Conant Street, Banglatown's commercial main street.

"Back in 2000, you used to see one car in two minutes. Now we have thousands of cars driving on the streets," Sadeak said. "All the immigrants came into this town and rebuilt the whole thing."

'Bread and butter' issue

In Rust Belt communities, immigration is a "bread and butter economic issue," said Steve Tobocman, executive director of Global Detroit, a nonprofit corporation that pursues strategies to attract international investment and business in southeast Michigan.

The state government under a Republican governor has concluded the same, issuing a report last year that said that the more than 640,000 foreign-born individuals in Michigan are "critical contributors to Michigan's economic success."

But the Trump administration argues that low-skilled or illegal immigrants are hurting American workers.

President Donald Trump's senior adviser for policy, Stephen Miller, told reporters last month that the president's immigration policies will prevent an influx of such workers into the country.

"In an environment in which you have this huge pool of unemployed labor in the United States, and you're spending massive amounts of money putting our own workers on welfare?" Miller asked. "We are constantly told that unskilled immigration boosts the economy but again, if you look at the last 17 years, we just know from reality that is not true."

However, the Michigan state government's economic report suggested that the estimated 126,000 undocumented immigrants in the state generally fill jobs different from native-born workers, "playing a small but critical role in the workforce."

The report concluded that the group has played a positive role in Michigan's economy, paying much more in taxes than the cost of the services such as education and law enforcement that they receive. The report suggested that giving legal status to these workers, and perhaps requiring them to pay back taxes, would be a net benefit for the state and its citizens.

Eight months into Donald Trump's presidency, Global Detroit's Tobocman says the administration's immigration policies and rhetoric have come with a hefty price tag: more than $1 billion in lost annual economic activity in Michigan.

"We have done some damage to America's brand as the world's most welcoming economy, most innovative economy, and a place where anybody can come and contribute to our growth and prosperity and live the American Dream," Tobocman said.

Policies and rhetoric, quantified

In collaboration with nine other Rust Belt states that make up the Welcoming Economies Global Network, Global Detroit calculated the combined projected economic loss in Michigan resulting from decreases in international tourism and international student applications, repercussions from the repeal of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program (DACA), and losses in agricultural production.

Of a combined projected $1.157 billion annual loss in statewide economic activity, $418.63 million comes at the hands of Trump's announced termination of DACA.

WATCH: A Look at Hamtramck

An additional $241 million was attributed to an assumed 16 percent decline in international tourism. The now-extended travel ban, Tobocman argues, is a primary source of a downturn in tourism among both Muslim tourists and others who are sympathetic, "who would like to see a more welcoming culture."

But even where hard numbers are more difficult to quantify, including losses in agricultural production and new refugee arrivals, Tobocman says the repercussions from Trump's policies and rhetoric are becoming clear.

"It's really enhanced enforcement … the deportation numbers are not significantly higher, but the kinds of raids that we have seen, and the kinds of treatment policies," he continued, "that sends a signal: that your labor is not really welcome here."

Weighing costs and benefits

In regions that have seen population decline, such as the Midwest, immigrants are "part of what's keeping those communities vibrant or growing at all," said Kim Rueben, senior fellow at the Urban Institute.

Rueben, a member of the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) panel that produced a comprehensive 2016 report on the long-term impacts of immigration on native-born workers and overall wages, noted that over a period of 10 years or more, the impact of immigration on the wages of native-born workers is very small and there's little evidence it affects the overall employment levels of U.S.-born workers.

Any decision to cut immigration numbers, Rueben told VOA, is both economically and fiscally costly.

She said eliminating DACA is particularly costly because DACA recipients tend to be well-educated and skilled workers.

"[DACA recipients] are contributing more to society because they are able to do those jobs that are in keeping with their education and the investments they have," Rueben said.

Rueben added that the children of lower-wage first-generation immigrants, such as farm workers, have shown a tendency to exceed education-level expectations.

Nationwide, according to a late-September poll released by Quinnipiac, 38 percent of voting Americans approve of the way Trump is handling immigration issues, compared to 59 percent who disapprove. The numbers reflect a five-point drop in approval since mid-August.

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Top US Official to Puerto Rico: ‘We Are Here … to Help’

WHITE HOUSE — 

Acting Homeland Security Administration Secretary Elaine Duke flew over hurricane devastated Puerto Rico Friday and reassured residents the federal government understands the severity of the ongoing human catastrophe facing the U.S. territory.

“I know the people of Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands are suffering,” Duke told a news conference in the capital, San Juan. “We are here and we have been here to help them. We are continuing to bring additional supplies and personnel to further assist distribution efforts on the ground.”

Duke’s unannounced trip to the island came hours after the mayor of Puerto Rico’s capital, San Juan, ridiculed comments the Homeland Security chief made at a White House briefing Thursday, where she described the life-saving efforts of relief workers as “a good news story.”

In a widely publicized CNN interview, Mayor Carmen Yulin Cruz replied angrily, saying, “This is not a good news story. This is a ‘people are dying’ story. This is a life or death story.”

Clearly stung by Yulin Cruz’s barb, Duke made clear that she did not consider the current conditions in Puerto Rico satisfactory.

WATCH: US Military Aids in Hurricane Irma Rescue and Relief Efforts

“Yesterday I was asked if I was happy and satisfied with the recovery,” she said. “I am proud of the work that’s being done. I’m proud of Americans helping Americans, friends and strangers alike. I am proud of the work DOD, (Department of Defense, FEMA (Federal Emergency Management Agency) and the territory, along with first responders are doing.

“The president and I will not be satisfied, however, until every Puerto Rican is back home, the power is back on, clean water is freely available, schools and hospitals are fully open, and the Puerto Rican economy is working,” the secretary said.

EPA assessing Superfund sites

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency said in a statement that it has deployed assessment teams to Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands.

“We have begun re-assessing Superfund sites, oil sites, and chemical facilities in Puerto Rico and the USVI as part of EPA’s response to Hurricane Maria,” the agency said.

It said that its initial assessments found the Superfund sites to have no significant damage. The agency is also working to assess the conditions of water and sewage treatment plants in Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands.

In the face of widespread criticism of Washington’s slow response to the Puerto Rico hurricane, the White House is in damage-control mode.

​‘You don’t just go back and fix it’

As he left the White House Friday for a weekend at his golf club in New Jersey, Trump told reporters the scope of destruction in Puerto Rico dwarfed the damage from hurricanes earlier this month in Texas and Florida.

“It was flattened. You don’t just go back and fix it,” he said.

“It’s a very tough situation and a big question is what happens. We have to rebuild. The electric(ity) is gone, the roads are gone, telecommunications (are) gone. It’s all gone, and the real question is what’s going to happen later,” the president said.

Earlier in the day, at a speech to a group of manufacturing industry leaders, he pledged to provide all possible assistance from Washington.

“We’ve never seen anything like this,” he said, noting that Washington is sending 10,000 federal personnel, including 5,000 National Guard members.

“We’ve closely coordinated with territorial and local governments which unfortunately aren’t able to handle this catastrophe on their own,” the president said.

Trump and other top administration officials are scheduled to visit the hurricane-ravaged region, including Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands, next Tuesday.

​Critics say ‘too, little, too late’

A three-star general was named Thursday to head the relief effort, and a 1,000 bed hospital ship, the Comfort, departed Friday from its home port in the U.S. state of Virginia to assist in the recovery. Homeland Security Adviser Tom Bossert said 44 of Puerto Rico’s 69 hospitals have been restored to operation.

But critics say the response may prove to be a case of too little, too late.

Russel Honore, highly lauded for commanding the military response after another big storm, Hurricane Katrina in 2005, said the military deployments to Puerto Rico should have been started at least four days earlier.

Honore told National Public Radio that because of its distance from the mainland and the loss of its power grid, Puerto Rico “is a bigger and tougher mission than Katrina.”

The head of the U.S. relief effort, Lieutenant General Jeffrey Buchanan, said Thursday it would be a long-term project.

“We’re bringing in more,” Buchanan told CNN. “This is a very, very long duration.”

Amid the tragedy, Trump said the one bright spot so far has been the ability of relief and rescue crews to keep hurricane-related death toll to a minimum.

“The loss of life is always tragic, but it’s been incredible the results we’ve had with respect to loss of life,” the president told reporters Friday. “People can’t believe how successful that has been, relatively speaking.”

Health officials, however, say worse days and weeks may still be ahead as authorities battle the massive task of restoring clean water and sanitation, not to mention providing food and shelter for Puerto Rico’s 3.4 million people.

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Women in Politics: Democrats Motivated to Run, GOP Aren’t

The president of Emily’s List rose to the podium at a recent New York fundraiser to make a proud announcement: More than 18,000 women had contacted the group since Election Day, looking to explore running for office, “an explosion,” she called it.

Of course, they’re all Democrats. On the Republican side, there’s been no such explosion. While a tide of anti-Trump activism has led thousands of Democratic women to consider runs for office, their Republican counterparts are where they were before the 2016 election, with little chance of improving their representation.

“Republican women look very much the same now as they did pre-Trump,” says Jennifer Lawless, professor at American University and co-author of a recent report that examined the persistent gender gap in political ambition, on both sides of the aisle. “They’re generally not interested in running for office, the overwhelming majority has not been recruited to run, they don’t think they’re qualified to run, and their levels of political activity and enthusiasm are the same as they have always been.”

Democrat women energized

Lawless’ report, called “The Trump Effect,” also throws some cold water on the expectation that Democrats will see a seismic shift in numbers of women running; re-energized political activism doesn’t necessarily translate into candidacies. But the new enthusiasm has been almost entirely on the left side of the spectrum, and some groups are trying to address that.

Erin Loos Cutraro, CEO of She Should Run, a nonpartisan group, says while the overall pace of adding women to elected office is too slow — women, after all, make up just less than 20 percent of Congress — it’s clearly happening faster for Democrats.

Part of the problem: uneven institutional resources and support.

“Feeling that you’re not going at it alone makes a big difference,” Cutraro said, “and it can feel really isolating for Republican women. They don’t have the same networks, just in sheer numbers ... or the same level of institutional support. If you’re a Democratic pro-choice woman, and you have Emily’s List there to support you, that can be incredibly powerful. Republican women don’t have anything that plays at the same level.”

​First steps

While a group like Emily’s List lends concrete support to get a candidate over the finish line, She Should Run serves women seeking that first step.

“‘I don’t even know where to start’ is something we hear over and over,” Cutraro said.

Rebecca Love is one of those women. A longtime Republican, she was president of the Republican club in high school, Love, 38, woke up at home in San Diego the morning after Election Day wanting to get involved, somehow.

“I felt that my values as a Republican woman were not represented by the candidate who was elected,” said Love, who has a young daughter and works in health care consulting. “I felt Republicans were better than this. It was a wakeup call.”

So Love began Googling programs for women interested in politics. Most, she found, were for Democrats, and her experience had been that even groups calling themselves nonpartisan were populated mostly by Democrats, some not eager to engage with Republicans. Finally, Love, who identifies as abortion-rights, moderate Republican, started working with She Should Run. She’s learning the political landscape of her community, and expects to pursue a city council seat or something similar.

By now, Love says, she feels confident enough that she doesn’t need to be “asked” to run. But she meets women who do: “I say to them, ‘You should think about running,’ and they say, ‘Me?”’

​Women need to be asked to run

Virtually any advocate working to get women into politics will say the same thing: Much more than men, women of any party need to be asked to run.

Julie Conway of VIEW PAC, which works to get Republican women elected to federal office, puts it this way: “You have to tell women, ‘Hey, you’d be great,’ and not only that, but you’d be the best, and now I’m going to have 10 other people tell you you’re the best. Guys just say, ‘Hey, I could do this.”’

Adds Stephanie Schriock, president of Emily’s List: “For years we’ve sat at kitchen tables, we’ve said, ‘You can do this, you don’t need five years of training, that dude has no training!”’

For Jinyoung Englund, getting asked by a former boss was a turning point. A daughter of Korean immigrants in Washington state, Englund got the bug for public service early, working on a congressional campaign and then on Capitol Hill while she was still in her 20s.

She hadn’t planned to run herself, and her first response, she says, was that it sounded “kinda crazy. ... Women, like myself, are often, ‘Hey, who am I to think I could run?”’

But she is now the Republican candidate in a much-watched special legislative election; Republican control of the state Senate hangs in the balance. At 33, she’d be the body’s youngest woman.

Not every woman, of course, needs to be asked.

Shantel Krebs, the South Dakota secretary of state and candidate for Congress, served 10 years in the state legislature — she was 30 when first elected in 2004, and had begun her legislative career at 17 as a page. Krebs says she hasn’t encountered the obstacles some other women describe, perhaps because South Dakota has a long history of women in positions of political power. The incumbent in the seat she’s seeking, Republican Kristie Noem, is running for governor.

“I think South Dakotans expect another woman in that position,” said Krebs, 44. “They know that women compromise and they listen.”

​The Trump question

Like Republican male candidates, GOP women must consider where they stand on President Donald Trump, their party’s polarizing leader. Depending on the district, it’s not always easy.

Asked about potential concerns among women voters about Trump’s attitudes toward women, Krebs, of South Dakota, says her constituents aren’t troubled by that.

“I haven’t heard from any of my constituents that they’re concerned. The concern here is bigger issues,” she said. “They want government to be accountable, to control spending.”

In Austin, Texas, Jenifer Sarver is preparing for the “Trump question,” even though she’s not yet running for office.

“Certainly people have told me that saying you didn’t vote for the president isn’t a good thing,” said Sarver, 41, who runs a communications consulting business and has been mentioned in the local media as a potential candidate to replace Rep. Michael McCaul _ who in turn has been mentioned as a potential Trump Cabinet member. “There are going to be people who won’t vote for me. But I believe I can attract people in the middle ... those who want to see that there are people of integrity and character running, who aren’t afraid to stand up to the system.”

This election cycle, there’s an additional concern for Republican women in Congress. Several aren’t running for re-election, either because they’re running for office elsewhere, or retiring. That could bring numbers of Republican women in Congress “down to numbers like we have not seen,” Lawless said. “It’s going to be very difficult for them to even maintain the numbers that they have.”

And that means a setback for women across the board, if you care about overall female representation in Congress. Because even with all the energy on the left, Lawless says, “the Democrats will have to have a hell of a banner year in order to compensate.”

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Tillerson’s Talks in Beijing Focus on North Korea

U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson arrived in Beijing Saturday, seeking China’s cooperation on a “maximum pressure” campaign against North Korea’s nuclear aggression amid heightened tensions on the Korean Peninsula.

He is scheduled to meet with top Chinese officials — President Xi Jinping, State Councilor Yang Jiechi and Foreign Minister Wang Yi — and focus on how to force North Korea to abandon its nuclear program. The talks will also include preparations for U.S. President Donald Trump’s first visit to China in November.

The U.S. is conferring closely with Chinese officials on Beijing’s commitment to curbing imports of North Korean coal, iron, iron ore, lead and lead ore, and seafood.

If fully implemented, the ban on those items could substantially reduce North Korea’s revenues this year. North Korea had earned $1.5 billion from the export of these items to China in 2016, according to the State Department.

China is North Korea’s No. 1 trade partner. Washington says bringing China on board is key to cutting off Pyongyang’s ability to earn hard currency.

Carnegie Endowment for International Peace’s Asia Program director Douglas Paal said, however, China’s influence over North Korea is limited.

“The North is very reluctant to take instructions from China. It will exploit whatever it can get from China, but it doesn’t look for political guidance from China. So this is a problem we [the U.S.] and South Korea are going to have to handle directly with North Korea as we go forward,” Paal told VOA.

VOA's Nike Ching contributed to this report.

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Amid Setbacks, Trump Eagerly Pushes Tax Reform

WASHINGTON — 

President Donald Trump capped what has been a difficult week politically with an all-out push for tax reform Friday. In a speech to the National Association of Manufacturers in Washington, Trump promised to deliver on a “giant, beautiful, massive, the biggest ever in our country, tax cut.”

Trump is eager to move past setbacks on health care reform and the results of a Republican Senate primary Tuesday in Alabama where he found himself on the losing side. The president and his administration also have been on the defensive over hurricane recovery efforts in Puerto Rico.

​Health care defeat

Senate Republicans put off a vote on a plan to repeal and replace Obamacare after it became clear they did not have enough votes to pass the measure, thanks to a handful of Republican defectors.

Democrats expressed relief they had beaten back another attempt to undo former President Barack Obama’s signature achievement, the Affordable Care Act.

“The reason this bill failed is because millions of Americans didn’t want it,” Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer told reporters at the Capitol.

​Rise of Roy Moore

On the same day, Christian conservative and former judge Roy Moore easily won a Republican Senate primary in Alabama, defeating incumbent Luther Strange, whom Trump had supported.

“We are put here on Earth for a short time, and for that short time our duty it to serve almighty God,” Moore said in his victory speech.

Moore has made controversial statements on a number of issues in the past, but he is considered the favorite in a race against Democrat Doug Jones in a general election Dec. 12.

Trump had appeared with Strange the week before at a rally in Alabama, but even some analysts said his heart did not appear to be in it.

“Trump was campaigning for Luther Strange, but you could tell he was having some second thoughts about that,” said Republican strategist John Feehery.

Harbinger of division?

Moore’s victory, aided by the active support of former Trump White House strategist Steve Bannon, signals what could be a series of divisive Republican primary battles heading into next year’s midterm congressional elections.

Writing in The Wall Street Journal, Karl Rove, the former chief political strategist for President George W. Bush, warned that “tough primary contests next year” will drain Republican funds that “might otherwise be used to defeat Democrats.”

Rove added that the latest failure on health care will “only deepen” Republican “distress” in advance of the midterms, and that passing tax reform has become “an existential imperative.”

WATCH: Amid Setbacks, Trump Seeks Comfort in his Base

Trump in the middle

The Republican splits also could ensnare the president in a series of internecine party battles.

“The more he [Trump] pursues the interests of the people who voted him into office at the expense of the Republican leadership, the greater the tensions within the Republican Party will become,” said Brookings Institution analyst Bill Galston.

Trump also courted controversy by waging a battle with professional football players about protests during the national anthem over concerns about racial in justice.

“For people to disrespect that by kneeling during the playing of our national anthem, I think is disgraceful,” Trump said at the White House Tuesday.

Many NFL players, coaches and some team owners took exception to the president’s critique.

“It seems like every time he is opening his mouth, it is something that is dividing our country and not pulling us together,” said New Orleans Saints head coach Sean Payton.

Base remains loyal

Trump supporters seemed to rally to the president’s side over the controversy. But some experts saw the NFL flap as an unnecessary political distraction.

“When Donald Trump is tweeting about the NFL and that distracts attention from passing tax reform or repealing and replacing Obamacare, the voters get upset about that,” said GOP strategist Feehery. “They don’t want all the nonsense. They want stuff to get done.”

Trump’s job approval rating averages 40 percent in recent public opinion polls, up slightly from last month. And despite the recent setbacks, Feehery sees few signs that Trump’s core supporters are preparing to abandon him.

“President Trump is not someone who is playing by the usual rules, and I think his disruptive nature actually plays pretty well with a Republican base that is very unhappy with Washington,” he said.

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White House Officially Issues Lowest Refugee Cap Ever

The White House has made it official: The annual cap on refugees coming into the United States in fiscal year 2018 will be 45,000. Calling it the “America First Refugee Program,” the late Friday announcement says it is “a level that upholds the safety of the American people.”

The new limit, which was submitted to Congress earlier in the week, puts the United States on track to accept fewer refugees in fiscal 2018 than in the past 37 years that the current refugee program, known as USRAP (United States Refugee Admission Program), has been in existence.

The White House said Friday that the decision was made after consulting with the secretary of state, the secretary of homeland security, and the president’s national security team.

White House: Safety first

It said the new ceiling is “designed to accommodate additional vetting procedures” designed to “thoroughly and safely process applicants for potential threats to public safety and national security.”

The announcement also said, “With this new ceiling, the United States will continue to permanently resettle more refugees than any other country, and we will continue to offer protection to the most vulnerable, including those who have been persecuted because of race, political opinion, nationality, religion, or membership in a particular social group.”

The White House also said the decision “reflects the need to concentrate limited resources on the approximately 270,000 aliens who have applied for asylum but have not been properly vetted, and are already present in the United States.”

​Refugees: ‘Pillar of national security’

Last year, the administration of President Barack Obama set the cap on refugees at 110,000, but the incoming administration of Donald Trump in January issued an executive order reducing the cap to 50,000, saying more refugees would be “detrimental to the interests of the United States.”

A bipartisan group of 34 U.S. senators, including former presidential candidates John McCain and Bernie Sanders, sent a letter to the White House on Monday, calling the refugee program “a critical pillar of our national security and our foreign policy.” It said 50,000 “is insufficient when compared to the millions of people who have been forced to flee their countries.”

Questioned earlier this week about the prospect of a 45,000 cap, refugee advocates also reacted with dismay.

David Robinson, executive director of Jesuit Refugee Service/USA, called the new refugee cap “shamefully low.” He called the change “a retreat from global leadership” that “undermines both our interests and our values.”

Linda Hartke, who heads the Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service resettlement agency, said the measure would be “callous and tragic.”

“We are not afraid of our new neighbors and are not fooled by cruel and false claims that refugees are a threat to our safety,” she said this week.

Legislative remedy

She said if members of Congress want to push back, there are legislative ways to do it.

“There are avenues,” she said. “Whether there are elected officials who choose to exercise those, I don’t know.”

A proposal put forth by the conservative Heritage Foundation last week suggests that federal lawmakers should “reassert congressional leadership in refugee policy,” and establish parameters for the executive branch based on historical levels. It also suggested that private sponsorship could be used to bolster the refugee program.

VOA immigration reporter Victoria Macchi contributed to this report.

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Kosovo President: US Will Be Directly Involved in Final Kosovo-Serbia Deal

Kosovo's president, Hashim Thaci, says U.S. Vice President Mike Pence has pledged that the United States will be directly involved in reaching a final agreement to normalize relations between Kosovo and Serbia.

Thaci told VOA's Albanian service after meeting with Pence on Friday at the White House that "Pence will be focused and maximally involved" in reaching a deal between the two countries.

"I believe that this willingness of the U.S. administration and personally of Vice President Pence is a guarantee for the success of this process," Thaci said.

He said he is confident the process will "lead Kosovo into a final agreement of normalization and reconciliation of Kosovo-Serbia relations and would open prospects for Kosovo's integration into the United Nations."

A White House statement Friday said Pence "expressed appreciation for Thaci's leadership, along with Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic, to advance the EU-facilitated dialog to normalize relations between Kosovo and Serbia."

The White House said Pence and Thaci "agreed on the importance of advancing reforms to strengthen the rule of law, fight corruption and boost economic growth" and said Pence reaffirmed the "United States' support for a sovereign, democratic and prosperous Kosovo."

The White House also encouraged Kosovo to ratify the border demarcation agreement with neighboring Montenegro "to resolve this long-standing issue."

Thaci told VOA that Pence called on Kosovo to solve the issues as soon as possible. He said Kosovo has "good neighborly relations with Montenegro" and stressed the importance of such ties.

"No one can support you if you build bad relationships with your neighbors. We have a lot of problems with Serbia. We cannot open other problems with our neighbors that could cost us the integration processes" with the European Union, he said.

Thaci said the issue is in the hands of Kosovo's parliament.

The border agreement was signed in 2015 but has not had sufficient support in Kosovo's parliament for ratification.

The European Union insists Kosovo must approve the border demarcation deal before its citizens enjoy visa-free travel within Europe.

Montenegro has recognized Kosovo's 2008 declaration of independence from Serbia, but Serbia vehemently opposes it.

VOA's Albanian service contributed to this report.

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Price Resigns From Trump Cabinet

WASHINGTON — 

President Donald Trump's health secretary resigned Friday afternoon, after his travel on costly charter flights triggered investigations and angered his boss.

Tom Price's partial repayment and public expression of regrets couldn't save his job.

The health and human services secretary became the first member of the president's Cabinet to leave office in a turbulent young administration that has seen several high-ranking White House aides ousted. Price served less than eight months.

Trump had said he was "not happy" with Price for hiring private charters on the taxpayer's dime for official travel, when cheaper commercial flights would have worked.

The flap over Price has overshadowed Trump's agenda and prompted scrutiny of other Cabinet members' travel. The House Oversight and Government Reform committee has launched a broad investigation of top political appointees.

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Trump Promotes Republican Tax Cuts, Says 'Rebirth of American Industry Has Begun'

U.S. President Donald Trump promoted his sweeping tax cut proposal before the nation's largest manufacturing advocacy group Friday, saying lower rates will make American businesses more robust global competitors.

"Under my administration, the era of economic surrender is over and the rebirth of American industry is beginning," Trump declared in a speech to the Washington-based National Association of Manufacturers.

Trump said the plan would cap the tax rate for most small and medium-sized businesses at 25 percent, a rate he said these types of enterprises have not seen in more than 80 years. "And it will be rocket fuel for the economy," he said.

The current tax code, Trump said, "punishes companies" for conducting business in the United States, encouraging them to relocate overseas, where he said there is an estimated $3 trillion in U.S. corporate wealth. "That’s stopping, and it’s stopping right now. We need a tax system that encourages companies to stay in America, grow in America, and hire in America.”

$5 Trillion tax cut plan

Trump's speech comes two days after a blueprint of a more than $5 trillion Republican tax cut plan was unveiled. It proposes tax cuts for wealthy Americans, businesses and the middle class while protecting deductions such as mortgage interest and charitable contributions.

The blueprint lacks critical details about the many tax breaks the White House and Republican congressional leaders want to eliminate to offset some of the trillions of dollars in revenue that would be lost through tax cuts. The administration contends that the overhaul would bolster the economy and create job growth in manufacturing and other sectors.

Trump touted several of the plan's provisions, including tax relief for investment in new equipment.

"That means more production, more investment and more jobs," he said.

The plan also calls for a corporate tax rate from 35 to 20-percent, a goal that has long had the support of House Republicans, and a one-time tax on the foreign earnings of U.S. companies.

Some outside budget experts estimate the blueprint could slash government tax revenue by more than $5 trillion over a 10-year period. To offset some of the lost revenue, Republicans must agree on cutting the federal budget.

In order to become law, Republican congressional leaders are tasked with attempting to unite their party, and the possibility of garnering some Democratic support.

Republicans control the White House and both houses of Congress, giving them a rare opportunity to revamp the tax code.

"This is our once-in-a-generation opportunity to fundamentally rethink our tax code. We can unleash the economy, promoting growth, attracting jobs, and improving American competitiveness in the global market,'' Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell said Tuesday.

Democrats oppose changes

Many Democrats, however, have said they will oppose changes that increase debt or benefit the wealthiest citizens.

The Republican plan "would result in a massive windfall for the wealthiest Americans and provide almost no relief to the middle class taxpayers who need it most," Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer told colleagues this week on the floor of the chamber.

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Trump Touts Puerto Rico Relief Effort as Critics Fault Washington’s Response

THE WHITE HOUSE — 

President Donald Trump is touting his administration’s disaster response in Puerto Rico, even as officials in the U.S. territory warn that much more help will be needed to fend off mass hunger and disease on the hurricane ravaged island.

Adding to his running series of Twitter posts on the subject, Trump noted that Puerto Rico’s Governor Ricardo Rossello had praised Washington’s responsiveness to the island’s needs.

Puerto Rico Governor Ricardo Rossello just stated: "The Administration and the President, every time we've spoken, they've delivered......

Puerto Rico is devastated. Phone system, electric grid many roads, gone. FEMA and First Responders are amazing. Governor said "great job!"

But the mayor of San Juan, Puerto Rico’s capital, hit back at stories about how well the relief efforts are going.

“This is a ‘people are dying’ story. This is a life or death story,” Mayor Carmen Yulin Cruz told CNN.

Yulin Cruz was reacting to an earlier comment by acting Homeland Security Secretary Elaine Duke that the life-saving efforts of relief workers was a “good news story.”

“Maybe from where she’s standing it’s a good news story,” Cruz said after hearing Duke’s remarks. “It’s irresponsible,” she said, urging Duke to come to Puerto Rico to see for herself.

Duke is likely to visit the U.S. island territory to see the recovery effort next Tuesday, along with President Trump. They also will stop at the U.S. Virgin Islands, which were also hard-hit by Hurricane Maria.

As he began a speech Friday to the National Association of Manufacturers, Trump said he was sending thoughts and prayers to people of Puerto Rico.

"We’ve never seen anything like this," he said, noting that Washington is sending 10,000 federal personnel, including 5,000 National Guard members.

“The recovery effort probably hasn’t been seen for something like this,” Trump said. “We want the people to be safe and sound, and we will be there every day until that happens."

Speaking at a hotel a few blocks from the White House, Trump mentioned that Puerto Rico’s electrical grid and infrastructure had been in poor shape beforehand, saying, “we’re literally starting from scratch.”

The president said Puerto Rico’s government would have to work with Washington to determine how the cleanup will be funded and what to do with the tremendous amount of existing debt already on the island.

“We’ve closely coordinated with territorial and local governments which unfortunately aren’t able to handle this catastrophe on their own,” said the president.

A three-star general was named Thursday to head the relief effort, and a 1,000 bed hospital ship, the Comfort, was departing Friday from its home port in the U.S. state of Virginia to assist in the recovery. Homeland Security Adviser Tom Bossert said 44 of Puerto Rico’s 69 hospitals have been restored to operation.

But critics say the response may prove to be a case of too little, too late.

Russel Honore, highly lauded for commanding the military response after another big storm, Hurricane Katrina in 2005, said the military deployments to Puerto Rico should have begun at least four days earlier.

Honore told National Public Radio that because of its distance from the mainland and the loss of its power grid, Puerto Rico "is a bigger and tougher mission than Katrina."

The head of the U.S. relief effort, Lieutenant General Jeffrey Buchanan, said Thursday it would be a long term project. “We’re bringing in more,” Buchanan told CNN. “This is a very, very long duration.”

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AP Sources: US Cuts Embassy Staff, Urges No Travel to Cuba

The United States is warning Americans against visiting Cuba and ordering more than half of U.S. personnel to leave the island, senior officials said Friday, in a dramatic response to what they described as "specific attacks'' on diplomats.

The decision deals a blow to already delicate ties between the U.S. and Cuba, longtime enemies who only recently began putting their hostility behind them. The embassy in Havana will lose roughly 60 percent of its U.S. staff, and will stop processing visas in Cuba indefinitely, the American officials said.

In a new travel warning to be issued Friday, the U.S. will say some of the attacks have occurred in Cuban hotels, and that while American tourists aren't known to have been hurt, they could be exposed if they travel to Cuba. Tourism is a critical component of Cuba's economy that has grown in recent years as the U.S. relaxed restrictions.

For now, the United States is not ordering any Cuban diplomats to leave Washington, another move that the administration had considered, officials said. Several U.S. lawmakers have called on the administration to expel all Cuban diplomats. In May, Washington asked two to leave, but emphasized it was to protest Havana's failure to protect diplomats on its soil, not an accusation of blame.

Almost a year after diplomats began describing unexplained health problems, U.S investigators still don't know what or who is behind the attacks, which have harmed at least 21 diplomats and their families, some with injuries as serious as traumatic brain injury and permanent hearing loss. Although the State Department has called them "incidents'' and generally avoided deeming them attacks, officials said Friday the U.S. now has determined there were "specific attacks'' on American personnel in Cuba.

Secretary of State Rex Tillerson made the decision to draw down the embassy overnight while traveling to China, officials said, after considering other options that included a full embassy shutdown. President Donald Trump reviewed the options with Tillerson in a meeting earlier in the week. The officials demanded anonymity because the moves have yet to be announced.

The United States notified Cuba of the moves early Friday via its embassy in Washington. Cuba's embassy had no immediate comment.

Cubans seeking visas to enter the U.S. may be able to apply through embassies in nearby countries, officials said. The U.S. will also stop sending official delegations to Cuba, though diplomatic discussions will continue in Washington.

The moves deliver a significant setback to the delicate reconciliation between the U.S. and Cuba, two countries that endured a half-century estrangement despite their locations only 90 miles apart. In 2015, President Barack Obama and Cuban President Raul Castro restored diplomatic ties. Embassies re-opened, and travel and commerce restrictions were eased. Trump has reversed some changes, but has broadly left the rapprochement in place.

The Trump administration has pointedly not blamed Cuba for perpetrating the attacks. Officials involved in the deliberations said the administration had weighed the best way to minimize potential risk for Americans in Havana without unnecessarily harming relations between the countries. Rather than describe it as punitive, the administration will emphasize Cuba's responsibility to keep diplomats on its soil safe.

To investigators' dismay, the symptoms in the attacks vary widely from person to person. In addition to hearing loss and concussions, some experienced nausea, headaches and ear-ringing, and the AP has reported some now suffer from problems with concentration and common word recall.

Though officials initially suspected some futuristic "sonic attack,'' the picture has grown muddier. The FBI and other agencies that searched homes and hotels where incidents occurred found no devices. And clues about the circumstances of the incidents seem to make any explanation scientifically implausible.

Some U.S. diplomats reported hearing various loud noises or feeling vibrations when the incidents occurred, but others heard and felt nothing yet reported symptoms later. In some cases, the effects were narrowly confined, with victims able to walk "in'' and "out'' of blaring noises audible in only certain rooms or parts of rooms, the AP has reported.

Though the incidents stopped for a time, they recurred as recently as late August. The U.S. has said the tally of Americans affected could grow.

Already, staffing at the embassy in Havana was at lower-than-usual levels due to recent hurricanes that have whipped through Cuba. In early September, the State Department issued an "authorized departure,'' allowing embassy employees and relatives who wanted to leave voluntarily to depart ahead of Hurricane Irma.

Though Cuba implored the United States not to react hastily, it appeared that last-minute lobbying by Castro's diplomats was unsuccessful. The days leading up to the decision involved a frantic bout of diplomacy that brought about the highest-level diplomatic contacts between the countries since the start of Trump's administration in January.

Last week, the Cuban official who has been the public face of the diplomatic opening with the U.S., Josefina Vidal, came to the State Department for a meeting with American officials in which the U.S. pressed its concerns. Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez used his speech to the U.N. General Assembly to insist Cuba had no idea what was harming American diplomats, while discouraging Trump from letting the matter become "politicized.''

As concerns grew about a possible embassy shut-down, Cuba requested an urgent meeting Tuesday between Rodriguez and Tillerson in which the Cuban again insisted his government had nothing to do with the incidents. Rodriguez added that his government also would never let another country hostile to the U.S. use Cuban territory to attack Americans.

Citing its own investigation, Cuba's embassy said after the meeting: "There is no evidence so far of the cause or the origin of the health disorders reported by the U.S. diplomats.''

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White House Deploying Military, Government Workers to Puerto Rico

WASHINGTON — 

White House officials say a federal force of 10,000 people, including 7,000 troops, are helping Puerto Rico dig out of the devastation left by Hurricane Maria.

The U.S. Navy ship Comfort, a 1,000-bed hospital ship based in the U.S. state of Virginia, is scheduled to depart the U.S. mainland for the island Friday. Homeland Security Adviser Tom Bossert said Puerto Rico has 44 operational hospitals out of a total of 69 facilities.

The Pentagon has appointed Lt. Gen. Jeffrey Buchanan to lead all military hurricane response efforts in Puerto Rico, a U.S. territory.

WATCH: US Officials Say Damaged Infrastructure Slows Aid Distribution in Puerto Rico

​Critics: Help too slow

Critics have accused the Trump administration of not responding more quickly to the disaster in the wake of the hurricane, which ravaged Puerto Rico on Sept. 17, taking out buildings, knocking out communications, and nearly destroying the island’s aging power grid.

On Thursday, Bossert defended the eight-day period between the declaration of an emergency in Puerto Rico and the naming of a leader for recovery efforts.

“It didn’t require a three-star general eight days ago,” he told reporters at a White House news briefing. Bossert also said some of the information he has heard on the news has been out of date.

“The coverage in some cases is giving the appearance that we are not moving fast enough,” he said.

​Bigger, tougher than Katrina

Russel Honore, highly lauded for commanding the military response after another big storm, Hurricane Katrina in 2005, said the military deployments to Puerto Rico are at least four days too late.

Honore told National Public Radio that because of its distance from the mainland and the loss of its power grid, Puerto Rico “is a bigger and tougher mission than Katrina.”

Stung by the criticism, administration officials have emphasized the complexity of delivering aid to the storm-ravaged territory.

“This is an insular island, a territory that stands some distance from the United States,” Bossert, the Homeland Security adviser, said.

“The constraints and limitations are different from a contiguous state here in the United States. We can position hundreds of trucks in Florida or Texas for restoration of line services. We can’t do that in Puerto Rico.”

Bossert also said, “The president and I have absolute, 100 percent confidence in what Secretary [Elaine] Duke, [FEMA Director] Brock Long, and the men and women of Puerto Rico are doing. They are going to get through this.”

On Thursday, Duke said the relief effort in Puerto Rico is “under control” and told White House reporters that Puerto Rico “is really a good news story, in terms of our ability to reach people.”

​Ships, trucks needed

FEMA regional administrator John Rabin told reporters Thursday that the U.S. government has so far delivered 1.1 million liters of water and about 1 million meals to the island of 3.5 million.

But he added that ships, not planes, are needed to get more supplies to the island.

“The only way we are going to get significant amounts of water and food is through ports and through barges and shipping,” he said. “You can’t get enough through the aircraft.”

He said officials are “very focused” on getting supplies from the ports to the distribution centers.

Army Brigadier General Richard Kim told reporters there are 4,400 Defense Department personnel in Puerto Rico, including Puerto Rican National Guard members.

Earlier Thursday, the Trump administration suspended a law that had been hampering delivery of desperately needed aid to hurricane victims, while House Speaker Paul Ryan said the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s disaster relief account would receive an additional $6.7 billion boost within days.

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U.S. Confirms Ambassador to Moscow at Crucial Time

WASHINGTON — 

The U.S. Senate has confirmed Jon Huntsman as the new U.S. ambassador to Russia, filling a void at a critical tie in U.S.-Russian relations.

Huntsman is a former governor of the U.S. state of Utah who previously served as ambassador to Singapore and China.

The confirmation was unanimous and swift, with Democrats and Republicans joining in a rare consensus to support President Donald Trump’s choice for the top U.S. diplomat in Moscow. The Washington Post quoted Democratic Senator Benjamin Cardin as saying Trump could not have made a better choice than Huntsman.

The new U.S. ambassador will arrive in Moscow as tensions remain high between the U.S. and Russia on issues that include allegations of Russian meddling in U.S. elections and interference in eastern Ukraine.

Trump has rejected allegations by political opponents that his campaign colluded with the Russians.

Huntsman testified this month before the Senate Foreign Relations committee and said there is, in his words, “no question” that Moscow interfered in last year’s presidential election.

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Legal About-faces: Trump Reverses Obama’s Course in the Courts

WASHINGTON — 

Backing employers over employees. Backing the state of Ohio over groups involved in voter registration. Backing a narrow reading of a sexual discrimination law over a broad one.

Those are just some of the legal about-faces President Donald Trump’s administration is making at the Supreme Court and in lower courts.

The Trump administration has found itself in court defending a variety of new policies: the president’s travel ban, the phasing out of a program protecting young immigrants, and the revisiting of a policy that had allowed transgender individuals to serve openly in the military.

But it’s also dealing with lawsuits that were in progress before the president took office, and asserting positions different from those of the Obama administration.

The Office of the Solicitor General, the Justice Department office that represents the federal government at the Supreme Court and determines what position it will take in federal appeals court cases, does some position switching every time the White House changes parties. But the office prizes its reputation as largely nonpartisan and switches positions with “a great deal of trepidation,” said Gregory Garre, who served as solicitor general under George W. Bush.

“The office’s currency and credibility before the court depends on it not being viewed as a political institution,” Garre said. He said Supreme Court justices, and Chief Justice John Roberts in particular, have given the office a hard time in court about flipping positions.

Arbitration agreements

On Monday, the first day of its new term, the Supreme Court will hear its first case in which the Trump administration is reversing course from its predecessor. In one of the most important business cases of the term, the Obama administration backed employees in a dispute with their employers over arbitration agreements. Now, the Trump administration is backing employers.

A federal agency, the National Labor Relations Board, is being permitted to defend the original position, meaning that two government lawyers will argue against each other. Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg has said that the unusual lineup “will be a first for me in the nearly 25 years I’ve served on the court.”

Voter rolls

The justices will soon consider a case in which the government now supports a method Ohio uses to remove people from voter rolls. When the case was being heard in a federal appeals court, the Obama administration argued that the method, which puts someone on the path to being removed from the rolls if they haven’t voted for two years, violates federal law.

Samuel Bagenstos, a University of Michigan law professor and former Justice Department official, called the switch in a longstanding position “stunning” because it reversed a view held for more than 20 years by Republican and Democratic administrations alike.

Lower court cases

While the highest-profile shifts in position may be those at the Supreme Court, the administration has also altered course in cases at lower-level courts. In cases about pollution-control rules put in place by the Obama administration, the Trump administration has asked for pauses in the litigation so the rules can be re-evaluated, said Pat Gallagher, the director of the Sierra Club’s environmental law program.

In a case out of Texas, the Obama administration had joined groups suing over a controversial voter ID law. The Trump administration, in contrast, has abandoned the argument that the state passed ID rules with discrimination in mind. It said changes signed by Texas’ governor should satisfy the courts.

The Trump administration has also aggressively shifted positions in cases involving gay rights, said Human Rights Campaign legal director Sarah Warbelow.

In a New York case involving a skydiving instructor who alleged he was fired after telling a customer he was gay, the Trump administration’s Justice Department weighed in to argue that a federal law barring “sex” discrimination means discrimination based on gender and doesn’t cover sexual orientation. The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission under President Barack Obama took the opposite view.

​Wedding cake case

The Trump administration is also supporting a Colorado baker who refused to make a wedding cake for a gay couple because of his religious beliefs, a case now before the Supreme Court.

Donald Verrilli, who served as solicitor general from 2011 to 2016, said the Obama administration either wouldn’t have weighed in on the case or would have supported the couple. But Verrilli, who himself backed position switches when he was solicitor general, declined to discuss other about-faces by his former office.

“It’s a hard job. You know, you’ve got to make difficult judgments in that job,” Verrilli said. “I’m sure they’re doing their best.”

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Twitter Tells Congress It Shut Down 200 Accounts Linked to Russia

Twitter told the House and Senate intelligence committees Thursday that it had shut down more than 200 accounts after determining they were linked to Russia and sought to interfere in U.S. politics.

The closed-door sessions followed similar briefings earlier this month with Facebook, which has also agreed to provide lawmakers with 3,000 Russia-linked ads involving divisive social and political issues that were placed on its platform.

The committees are examining the spread of false news stories and whether anyone in the United States aided in targeting content to certain users. In the case of Twitter, that includes examining so-called bot accounts that are set up to quickly and automatically spread information.

"Of the roughly 450 accounts that Facebook recently shared as a part of their review, we concluded that 22 had corresponding accounts on Twitter. All of those identified accounts had already been or immediately were suspended from Twitter for breaking our rules," Twitter announced in a blog post Thursday afternoon. "In addition, from those accounts we found an additional 179 related or linked accounts, and took action on the ones we found in violation of our rules."

Twitter also said the Russian news site RT spent $274,100 in ads on its platform in 2016.

But despite the disclosures, ranking lawmakers said they were disappointed in Twitter's handling of the issues.

Democratic Representative Adam Schiff of California said, "Much of the information that Twitter used to identify Russian-linked accounts, however, was derived from Facebook's own analysis, and it is clear that Twitter has significant forensic work to do to understand the depth and breadth of Russian activity during the campaign."

Senator Mark Warner, a Virginia Democrat, said the company "showed an enormous lack of understanding ... about how serious this issue is, the threat it poses to democratic institutions."

The meetings with technology companies have so far been closed to the public, but both the House and Senate intelligence committees are planning to hold public hearings about the use of online tools in connection with efforts to influence the election.

The committees have invited Facebook, Twitter and Google's parent company, Alphabet, to appear, with the House panel planning to hold its hearing in October and the Senate committee in early November.

In a report earlier this year, U.S. intelligence agencies said it was their assessment that Russian President Vladimir Putin had ordered an influence campaign aimed at the U.S. election in order to boost Donald Trump's chance of winning the presidency while hurting the campaign of Democratic challenger Hillary Clinton.

Trump has expressed skepticism of the conclusion. In July, he said, "I think it could very well have been Russia, but I think it could well have been other countries, and I won't be specific."

The president, who has frequently criticized the media, on Wednesday used Twitter to suggest Facebook worked with television news companies and top U.S. newspapers to work against him during the election.

"Trump says Facebook is against him. Liberals say we helped Trump. Both sides are upset about ideas and content they don't like. That's what running a platform for all ideas looks like," Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg said in a response to Trump's tweet.

"After the election, I made a comment that I thought the idea misinformation on Facebook changed the outcome of the election was a crazy idea," Zuckerberg added. "Calling that crazy was dismissive and I regret it. This is too important an issue to be dismissive. But the data we have has always shown that our broader impact — from giving people a voice to enabling candidates to communicate directly to helping millions of people vote — played a far bigger role in this election."

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HHS Chief Price Promises to Repay Charter Costs

A day after President Donald Trump's rebuke, health secretary Tom Price promised on Thursday to reimburse taxpayers for his cost on charter flights taken while on government business. He issued a public apology as he fought to keep his job.

"I regret the concerns this has raised regarding the use of taxpayer dollars," Price said in a statement. "I was not sensitive enough to my concern for the taxpayer."

The Health and Human Services secretary said he'll swear off charter flights — "no exceptions" — and repeated his promise to fully cooperate with ongoing investigations.

Price also said he hopes to keep his job, but at the White House, press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders wouldn't go that far.

"We're going to conduct a full review and we'll see what happens," Sanders told reporters.

On Wednesday, Trump declared that he's "not happy" with his health chief over reports that Price flew on costly charters when he could have taken cheaper commercial flights on government business. Asked whether he would fire Price, Trump said, "We'll see."

Price told reporters Thursday, "I think we've still got the confidence of the president." About the controversy, he said, "We're going to work through this."

In his statement, Price said he would write a personal check Thursday covering his travel costs on charter flights. "The taxpayers won't pay a dime for my seat on those planes." He did not address the costs incurred by those traveling with him.

His office did not respond when asked how much Price would pay. It's unclear if it would cover the full difference for flying the secretary's entourage on charters as compared to commercial airlines.

A former GOP congressman from Georgia, Price also played a supporting role in the fruitless Republican effort to repeal Barack Obama's health care law — another source of frustration for the president.

Wide-ranging investigation

Prompted partly by controversy over Price, the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee launched a wide-ranging investigation into travel by Trump's political appointees. On Wednesday, the committee sent requests for detailed travel records to the White House and 24 departments and agencies, dating back to the president's first day in office.

The letters were signed by the committee's chairman, Rep. Trey Gowdy, R-S.C., and its ranking Democrat, Elijah Cummings of Maryland. Lawmakers are demanding information on use of government planes for personal travel, as well as use of private charters for official travel. The committee wants details by Oct. 10.

The president vented his displeasure with Price to reporters on Wednesday as he left the White House for a trip to sell his tax overhaul in Indianapolis.

"I was looking into it, and I will look into it, and I will tell you personally I'm not happy about it," Trump responded when asked about Price's travel. "I am not happy about it. I'm going to look at it. I'm not happy about it and I let him know it."

Travel details

Price's travels were first reported last week by Politico, which said it had identified a couple dozen charter flights at a cost of hundreds of thousands of dollars. Cheaper commercial flights were a viable option in many cases.

On a June trip to Nashville, Price also had lunch with his son, who lives in that city, according to Politico. Another trip was from Dulles International Airport in the Washington suburbs to Philadelphia International Airport, a distance of 135 miles.

Last Friday the HHS inspector general's office announced it was conducting a review to see if Price complied with federal travel regulations, which generally require officials to minimize costs.

Price's office had initially said the secretary's demanding schedule sometimes did not permit the use of commercial airline flights.

Price, an ally of House Speaker Paul Ryan, is a past chairman of the House Budget Committee, where he was a frequent critic of wasteful spending. As HHS secretary, he has questioned whether the Medicaid health insurance program for low-income people delivers results that are worth the billions of dollars taxpayers spend for the coverage.

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Trump, Ryan Clear the way for Government Cash to Puerto Rico

WASHINGTON — 

On the defensive over the pace of federal help for Puerto Rico, President Donald Trump and congressional Republicans cleared the way Thursday for more supplies and government cash for the hurricane-ravaged U.S. island.

Trump waived federal restrictions on foreign ships delivering cargo. And House Speaker Paul Ryan said the Federal Emergency Management Agency's disaster relief account will get a $6.7 billion boost by the end of the week. Trump and his advisers, meanwhile, defended the administration's response to the devastation on the island, which was hit by Hurricane Maria Sept. 20 with many people left desperate for power, food and other supplies.

"The electric power grid in Puerto Rico is totally shot. Large numbers of generators are now on Island. Food and water on site," Trump tweeted early in the day.

The developments Thursday came after Trump came under sharp criticism for what critics said was a too-slow response to a humanitarian crisis among Puerto Rico's 3.4 million residents.

From the White House driveway to cable television, a squad of advisers defended the president's response and described the relief efforts as well underway, with most hospitals "operational."

Acting Homeland Security Secretary Elaine Duke said she signed the waiver of a federal law called the Jones Act to clear the way for foreign-flagged ships to deliver supplies between U.S. ports.

"You are seeing devastation in Puerto Rico. That is the fault of the hurricane," Duke told reporters in the White House driveway. "The relief effort is under control."

Tom Bossert, Trump's homeland security adviser, said the impression of a slow response isn't so much wrong as it is outdated. He said more than 40 of the island's 69 hospitals are accepting patients.

And FEMA Administrator Brock Long said the efforts have been hampered by damaged airports and ports on the island.

"The question is that last mile," Long told CNN, speaking of the difficulty of getting aid all the way to those in need.

Ryan, meanwhile, said a "huge capital injection will occur in two days" to help Puerto Rico recover. He noted Trump had waived a matching funds requirement, which means the cash-strapped island won't have to contribute to the initial costs of the federal assistance. The Wisconsin Republican said he expects the Trump administration to send Congress a request for a long-term recovery package once damage assessments are conducted.

"We will quickly act on that request," Ryan said.

Duke said the shipping waiver came in response to a request from Puerto Rico Gov. Ricardo Rossello. The waiver, the White House said, would go into effect immediately.

Rossello responded on Twitter to Trump's action: "Thank you @POTUS."

Duke had waived the law earlier this month to help ease fuel shortages in the Southeast following hurricanes Harvey and Irma. That order included Puerto Rico but expired last week, shortly after Maria struck.

The Trump administration initially said a waiver was not needed for Puerto Rico because there were enough U.S.-flagged ships available to ferry goods to the island.

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New Travel Ban Leaves Iranian-Americans in Limbo

LONG BEACH, CALIF. — 

U.S. Navy veteran Mohammed Jahanfar has traveled overseas four times in the last year to visit his Iranian fiancee, most recently hoping to complete government paperwork that would allow her to come live with him in the United States.

But the 39-year-old now fears they will be forever separated after President Donald Trump's administration rolled out new restrictions blocking most Iranians from traveling to America. The new restrictions covering citizens of Chad, Iran, Libya, North Korea, Somalia, Syria, and Yemen — and some Venezuelan government officials and their families — are to go into effect October 18.

"It is devastating,'' said Jahanfar, who works as a salesman in Long Beach, California, and has lived in the United States for three decades. "There should be no reason why my fiancee, who is an educated person in Iran, who has a master's degree, why we cannot be with each other. I cannot wrap my head around it.''

This is the Trump administration's third measure to limit travel following a broad ban that sparked chaos at U.S. airports in January and a temporary order issued months later that was challenged in the courts and expired last weekend.

Jahanfar is among 385,000 Iranian immigrants in the United States, according to the Census Bureau, more than any of the other countries covered by the travel restrictions issued last weekend.

The U.S. has a many-layered history with Iran, a Middle Eastern ally until the pro-American shah was overthrown by the Islamic Revolution of 1979. The shah came to the U.S. and so did tens of thousands of other Iranians.

Now, the U.S. and Iranian governments have no diplomatic relations. Even so, many Iranians and Iranian-Americans have been able to regularly travel back and forth and kept close family ties.

The new restrictions range from an indefinite ban on visas for citizens of Syria to more targeted limitations. Iranians will not be eligible for immigrant, tourism or business visas but remain eligible for student and cultural exchange visas if they undergo additional scrutiny.

The measures target countries that the Department of Homeland Security says fail to share sufficient information with the U.S. or haven't taken necessary security precautions.

Iranian-American advocates said they've been fielding phone calls from frantic community members who fear they will remain separated from family or their dreams. Already, many Iranian visa applicants find themselves caught up in lengthy security checks, delaying their travel plans.

"People don't know what to do,'' said Ally Bolour, an immigration attorney in Los Angeles. "If you are from one of these banned countries, there is just so much going on already. This just adds another layer, and people are just petrified.''

Trita Parsi, president of the National Iranian American Council, said the ban seems aimed at punishing mainly Muslim countries.

"This process does not start with, `OK, where does the threat emanate from, and what can we do about it?''' Parsi said. "It started with, `What are the countries we have bad relations with and what can we do there?'''

The new rules permit, but do not guarantee, case-by-case waivers for citizens of the affected countries who meet certain criteria. It's unclear, however, how difficult it will be to obtain a waiver, and consular officers have broad discretion over these applications, said Diane Rish, associate director of government relations for the American Immigration Lawyers Association.

The rules have also dampened some Iranians' desire to be here. Hanieh, who did not want her last name used fearing reprisals from officials in the U.S. or Iran, said she is finishing her doctorate in the United States but seeking jobs in Canada due to uncertainty about whether she will be able to work here and what she sees as growing anti-Iranian sentiment.

She said her parents received word from U.S. consular officials this week they will not be able to travel for her graduation because of the ban.

Jahanfar, whose family left Iran after the country's revolution, said he doesn't know what he will do. He proposed to his fiancee last year after the pair, who met as children in Iran, had reconnected.

He applied for a fiancee visa in January and traveled to Abu Dhabi earlier this month for an interview with U.S. consular officials but was told it would be delayed.

Now, he said their lives are in limbo.

"It is pointless,'' he said. "One person can decide something — they don't understand how many lives they'll affect with one decision they make.''

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Poll: 4 in 5 Americans Feel 'Dreamers' Should Stay in US, Become Citizens

WASHINGTON — 

An overwhelming majority of American voters believe undocumented immigrants who were brought to the U.S. as children should be allowed to remain in the country and become citizens, according to a new Qunnipiac University poll.

Eighty-two percent of voters, including nearly 70 percent of Republicans, believe the so-called “Dreamer” immigrants should be able to stay and apply for citizenship. Only 6 percent felt they should be permitted to remain but not become citizens. Ten percent of the respondents said dreamers should be forced to leave the U.S.

By a 72-to-19-percent margin, voters agreed with U.S. President Donald Trump's decision to work with Democratic lawmakers on legislation to protect Dreamers. But voters were opposed 57-to-37 percent on including funds in the bill to build a wall along the U.S.-Mexican border.

On the question of whether to build a wall on the border, 57-percent opposed it compared to 37-percent who favored it.

Dreamers is a reference to children who qualify for the DREAM Act (Development, Relief, and Education for Alien Minors). First introduced in 2001, the act was designed to provide a pathway to children who were brought to the U.S. without documentation.

Republicans reveal bill Monday

After Congress failed to approve the measure in 2010, then-U.S. President Barack Obama launched a temporary program that enabled Dreamers to undergo background checks and apply for work permits. The program is called the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA, and allows work permits and other protections for some 800,000 people.

On Monday, conservative Republicans in Congress unveiled a bill that includes their ideas about the eventual fate of Dreamers when DACA expires in March. The measure, co-sponsored by Senators Thom Tillis and James Lankford, calls for tougher restrictions on Dreamers than proposed by Democrats.

Drafted in response to Trump's move to end the DACA program, the bill would prohibit Dreamers from applying for citizenship for at least 15 years and would cover fewer people than the Democratic proposal.

Path to citizenship

Trump had previously expressed support for the Democratic bill, but later said he wanted to include provisions for additional border security measures.

Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer and House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi have said they discussed in a meeting with Trump the path to citizenship for Dreamers after eight years.

Democrats, meanwhile, are waiting for the Trump administration to disclose a list of principles to guide Dreamer legislation.

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Job in Jeopardy, Top US Health Official Keeps to Schedule

A day after President Donald Trump declared his displeasure with him, Health and Human Services Secretary Tom Price showed up Thursday to get a very public flu shot.

Price did not mention the controversy over his costly charter flights in his remarks at an event urging people to get vaccinated against the flu, and he left before a question-and-answer session with the media.

Trump declared Wednesday that he's "not happy" with Price. Asked whether he plans to fire Price, Trump responded Wednesday: "We'll see."

A former GOP congressman from Georgia, Price played a supporting role in the fruitless Republican effort to repeal Barack Obama's health care law, which has been another source of frustration for the president. Price is known as a conservative policy expert, but his penchant for taking private charter aircraft on the taxpayers' dime is creating new headaches for the White House.

Late Wednesday, Price's office said he's heard the criticism and has taken it to heart. There was no indication he would be stepping down.

Prompted partly by controversy over Price, the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee on Wednesday sent requests for detailed travel records to the White House and 24 departments and agencies, dating back to Trump's first day in office.

The letters were signed by the committee's chairman, Rep. Trey Gowdy, R-S.C., and its ranking Democrat, Elijah Cummings of Maryland. Lawmakers are demanding information on political appointees' use of government planes for personal travel, as well as their use of private charters for official travel. The committee wants details by October 10.

The president vented his displeasure with Price to reporters as he left the White House for a trip to sell his tax overhaul in Indianapolis.

"I was looking into it, and I will look into it, and I will tell you personally I'm not happy about it," Trump responded when asked about Price's travel. "I am not happy about it. I'm going to look at it. I'm not happy about it and I let him know it."

Trump's comments seemed to take the health secretary's office by surprise. For hours, there was no response from the Health and Human Services Department, but Wednesday evening, a spokeswoman released a statement.

"As the secretary said over the weekend, he's heard the criticism and the concerns," said spokeswoman Caitlin Oakley. "He takes that very seriously and has taken it to heart." Previously Price's office had said it's cooperating with a review by the HHS inspector general, and he will stop flying on charters until that investigation is complete.

Price's travels were first reported last week by Politico, which said it had identified 26 charter flights at a cost of hundreds of thousands of dollars. Cheaper commercial flights were a viable option in many cases.

On a June trip to Nashville, Price also had lunch with his son, who lives in that city, according to Politico. Another trip was from Dulles International Airport in the Washington suburbs to Philadelphia International Airport, a distance of 135 miles.

The HHS inspector general's office is looking to see if Price complied with federal travel regulations, which generally require officials to minimize costs.

Price's office said the secretary's demanding schedule sometimes does not permit the use of commercial airline flights.

Trump's publicly-expressed displeasure — or ambivalence — has been a sign in the past that the tenure of a key aide will soon be over.

Back in August, the president was asked if he still had confidence in Steve Bannon, then a senior strategist in the White House. "He's a good person. He actually gets very unfair press in that regard. But we'll see what happens with Mr. Bannon," Trump said. Bannon was out three days later.

Price, an ally of House Speaker Paul Ryan, is a past chairman of the House Budget Committee, where he was a frequent critic of wasteful spending. As HHS secretary, he has questioned whether the Medicaid health insurance program for low-income people delivers results that are worth the billions of dollars taxpayers spend for the coverage. He's a former orthopedic surgeon who once practiced in an inner city hospital.

A group of Democratic lawmakers on Wednesday called for Price's resignation. Reps. Ruben Gallego of Arizona, Ted Lieu of California, Brenda Lawrence of Michigan, Jamie Raskin of Maryland and Pramila Jayapal of Washington said in a letter that Price breached the public's trust.

Republicans, however, largely remained mum. GOP lawmakers know Price as a colleague and regard him as a serious student of policy who can instill conservative priorities in the vast bureaucratic apparatus of HHS.

Other members of the Cabinet contacted by The Associated Press last week said they personally foot the bill for chartered travel or reimburse taxpayers the difference between commercial and chartered travel. The exceptions are when they are traveling with the president or vice president aboard government planes.

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US Congressman Scalise Returns to Capitol Hill After Being Shot

U.S. Congressman Steve Scalise (R - LA) returned to the House of Representatives Thursday for the first time since being shot in an attack on June 14 just outside Washington.

"I'm back," the House Majority Whip tweeted months after sustaining life-threatening injuries.

Scalise was greeted with an extended round of applause from colleagues as he slowly walked into the House chamber with the aid of two forearm crutches.

The congressman's office said he would speak on the House floor and cast votes in his first public appearance since the shooting in Alexandria, Virginia just south of the nation's capitol.

The Republican lawmaker told CBS's "60 Minutes" recently that one bullet from a high-powered rifle shattered his femur and damaged his hip and pelvis. He also suffered damage to a number of internal organs and underwent numerous surgeries. He said doctors "did a phenomenal job of rebuilding ...Humpty Dumpty," adding "They put me back together again."

Sixty-six-year-old James Hodgkinson opened fire during a Republican practice for the Congressional Baseball Game, an annual bi-partisan charitable event. Scalise was so severely injured that doctors said he was at "imminent risk of death" when he arrived at the hospital.

Three other people were shot and two others suffered other injuries.

Hodgkinson, a small business owner from the midwestern state of Illinois, was shot by police at the scene of the attack and died from his wounds.

The police investigation revealed Hodgkinson had purposely targeted Republican lawmakers.

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